God Is Beautiful
For many years (a phrase which seems to introduce almost everything I say or write these days), I have thought about and preached on the subject of the beauty of God. I have never heard anyone teach on the subject, but I did through the decades come across two written sermons on the topic, “The Beauty of the Lord” by J. D. Jones and “Are There Shortcuts to the Beauty of Holiness?” (the short answer is “No!”) by A. W. Tozer. More recently, I read a review of a scholarly article about the American preacher Jonathan Edwards (of “sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” fame) that mentioned in passing that the beauty of God was one of the great themes in his preaching. I was thus encouraged that I have not headed off on an unprofitable tangent. In simple terms, beauty is that which attracts, causes a favorable interest, and creates an affinity. Such real, eternal beauty is found in our God. (I will be using this opening paragraph for each of the brief messages in this series. The following material will change daily.)
Physical attractiveness is not inherently wrong, for God has crafted much beauty into His complex creation. The desire, for example, to beautify a place of worship is biblical. In II Chronicles 3:1-6, Solomon began building the Temple, a permanent place of worship to replace the Tabernacle. The elaborate garnishing of this building was done “for beauty” (verse 6). The intent was to construct a distinctive place to honor God; the temple’s beauty was intended to present a sense of separation, devotion, and respect. We should remember that the plan for this grand structure was not conceived by Solomon; rather, it was given by God Himself to David (Solomon’s father) in a vision (I Chronicles 28:19). We read in Ezra 7:27 of the rebuilt Temple: “Blessed be the LORD God of our fathers, Which hath put such a thing as this in the king’s heart, to beautify the house of the LORD which is in Jerusalem.”(I always beautify the house of the Lord, for every time I go to church I bring my wife along.) Isaiah 60:13 speaks of a Temple that will be built in Jerusalem in the future: “The glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee, the fir tree, the pine tree, and the box [tree] together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary; and I will make the place of my feet glorious.” The principle for us is that making our place of worship beautiful is not necessarily vanity. However, an overemphasis on such external attractiveness is dangerously misplaced. We read in Ezekiel 7:20-22 of the sad end of Solomon’s Temple. “The beauty of His ornament [the Temple]” was destroyed because the purpose of the Temple had been corrupted; the spiritual beauty that it exemplified had been lost in empty ritual and idolatry (a modern form being entertainment in lieu of genuine worship). If the spiritual attractiveness has departed, then any remaining physical beauty is but a vanishing veneer.